The Red Hat Pt 1
by jiratheman1
Summary: In this short fictional blog post by Dr. John H. Watson, John recounts one of the shortest mystery that has ever crossed Sherlock. It all starts when Sherlock receives a small red hat in the mail that doesn't even have his address on it. What Sherlock thought to be a little puzzle develops into an inner look of Sherlock's memory, and how the best student died. Note:Only Pt 1


The Red Hat

Dr. John H. Watson

Sherlock was often getting little things in the mail from his fans, he tells practically everyone his address 221B Baker Street (So do I of course), and they are always little things that are close to the persons heart, and they send them with a little "fan" letter and a return address with a few stamps and pieces of paper so that Sherlock can write down his deductions about the fan, and then he sends them the letter back. Sherlock doesn't mind this as it keeps his mind busy when he is not on a case, however, Mrs. Hudson on the other hand, is getting tired of signing packages for Sherlock, so she told me to tell you guys to stop, but please keep sending them, because a busy Sherlock is not an annoying Sherlock.

Sherlock was going through his little weekly deliverance of packages when he spotted an unmarked package with a little red hat inside of it. It was about the size of a hat that you would either put on a doll or a baby. The package only had the hat, no trace of Sherlock's address, or anything else but the red hat. Sherlock was immediately intrigued by this red hat, and swiped all of the other packages off of the table. A few seconds later, I asked him "What is it?" to which he didn't respond but kept muttering to himself. I took this as a sign of a deduction in progress and went back to the paper.

After I had finished reading about how the Greek government still had no idea how to work with money, I decided to ask Sherlock again

"Sherlock, what is that?"

"Well, John," he said as he turned toward me with a sarcastic look "Your deduction skills aren't as good as I thought. This," he started twirling the hat around his finger "is a small red hat."

"Yes I can see that." I replied slightly annoyed at the response I was given, "But where is it from? I noticed the lack of addresses anywhere on the box that you threw at me, aiming for the trashcan I think, which is on your other side by the way."

"Well," replied Sherlock, "At least you aren't a _terrible _deducer. I don't know where it came from, but I do know that it is old," He said as he looked on the inside of the hat, smelling it, turning it around, the lot. "About thirty years old I would imagine. You would think it was a dolls hat, but who washes their dolls head with shampoo? No, it is definitely a little girl's hat."

"How do you know? Red can be a boy colour as well."

"Don't be silly John. There are longer hairs on the inside of the hat. And besides, the tag says Sarah."

"Ah." I said feeling a little bit embarrassed, "So what is it then? A clue, a hint, what?"

"Well if it is a clue, than it is certainly a vague one. Hold on. Hush! Don't say or think _anything_! No, it can't be. Can it? No. But that was 23 years ago. But, the blonde hair, the smell of the shampoo. No, there is no way this is connected to _that_ Sarah. Oh dear no."

"Sherlock I can't help but notice that you are sounding quite concerned over there. What is it?"

"John, back when I was in my second year of primary school, there was a girl in my class, named Sarah. She always wore a little hat to school, it was smaller than a normal hat, but she explained during show and tell day in year one that it was hers from when she was a baby. She had an emotional attachment to it, and it was always on her head. She was the best student in the class, sitting in the front row, never once missed a day of school, always looked happy, and was an overall good person to everybody. However, on the Wednesday before the last day of second year, she came to school with a worried look on her face. I could tell something was wrong with her, but she didn't want to talk to me. I tried to tell the teacher that something was wrong with her, but she wouldn't listen to me."

I nodded my head to show that I was following him.

"Sarah wasn't at school on Thursday, and I was really worried about her, because I knew that something was wrong. The teacher didn't find it odd at all that her best student would break her perfect attendance on the second last day."

Sherlock paused to sip his tea, which he then spit out again, presumably because it was poured three hours ago, and he just noticed it.

"On Friday, the last day of school, we learned a number of things about Sarah. The first of which was that she lived on a farm about 15km away from the school. The second was that she walked to and from school, and the final thing was that she was found dead on the road about eleven o'clock on Thursday morning about 13km from the school building."

"Oh dear!" I interjected.

"The official report was that the girl had stepped in a pothole that was a few meters from where she was, twisted her ankle and was hit by a car when she was trying to get back up. Her head was smashed in, and there were skid marks leading up to where it is presumed that she was hit. It was a hit and run though, and the police never found out who did it. I was friends with the local police chief, as I had helped him on some minor cases, who was stealing the city planner's newspaper and giving him the one from five years ago on the same date. It was the delivery boy if you were wondering, his dad was running for the position and the current city planner won. Anyway, I was able to look at the pictures from the crime scene and I tried to bring up a fuss about the red hat, but no one knew anything about it, and said that it wasn't at the scene."

"It's just like those shoes all over again then hm?" I asked.

"No, this time, there wasn't use of any drugs, and her ankle was definitely twisted, unlike Carl Powers who had a seizure randomly in the pool. This is different, but not by much."

"Sherlock, could this be Moriarty? He is back remember."

"Nope, it isn't Moriarty, this one is too simple."


End file.
